Topic 16 hrs

1
Action Research for Professional Growth
Development

• Topic 1(6 hrs)
• Background and concept of Teacher as researcher
  (Lecture)
• What it is
• Origin and development
• Professional standards for teachers
• Action Research Principles and Practice
  (Self-learning and collaboration)
• Individual v Collaborative Action Research

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Action Research
Inquiry-based research conducted by teachers that
follows a process of examining existing
practices, implementing new practices, and
evaluating the results, leading to an
improvement cycle that benefits both students
and teachers. Also known as practitioner
research, teacher research, site-based research,
and action science. cs3.wnmu.edu/elearning/a404/
support/a404b0_50100.html
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ACTION RESEARCH refers to

• Professionals studying their own practice in
  order to improve it.
• Applied to teaching, it involves gathering and
  interpreting "data" to better understand an
  aspect of your teaching that interests or
  concerns you.
• An alternative to teachers who have been
  encouraged to look to others, rather than to
  themselves and their students, for ways to
  improve their teaching.
• Action research is an important recent
  development in the broad territory of "teachers'
  professional development."

Tom Russell, Queens University http//educ.queens
u.ca/russellt/howteach/arguide.htmarwhy
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Action Research Tracing the origins and
development in Teacher Education

• Kurt Lewin (1940)
• Stephen Corey (1950)
• Lawrence Stenhouse (1970s)
• Carr and Kemmis (1980s to date)
• John Elliot (1990s to date)
• Donald Schon (1980s)
• Jack Whitehead (1970 to date)
• Jean McNiff (1990 to date)

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Kurt Lewin (1946)

• Coined the word Action Research
• Research for social management or social
  engineering in industrial contexts.

Lewins Action Research Involves a spiral of
steps, each of which is composed of a circle of
planning, action and fact-finding about the
result of the action
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Lawrence Stenhouse
Teacher as Researcher
The teacher is like a gardener who treats
different plants differently and not like a
large-scale farmer who administers standardized
treatments to as-near-as possible standardized
plants. Under such conditions variation of
treatment gives a better gross yield attempting
to maximise the yield of every individual unit
and this is what is required of education. The
teacher must diagnose before he prescribes and
then vary the prescription. both teachers and
pupils are involved in meaningful action and
meaningful action cannot be standardised by
control or sampled.
Lawrence Stenhouse Feb 1979, University of East
Anglia, UK In Research as a basis for teaching
Readings from Lawrence Stenhouse by Rudduck and
Hopkins
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Lawrence Stenhouse
Teacher as researcher
Real classrooms have to be our laboratories, and
they are in the command of teachers, not of
researchers. This is the characteristic of
professional schools the research act must
conform to the obligations of the professional
context. This is what we mean by action
research. Lawrence Stenhouse Feb 1979,
University of East Anglia, UK
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Lawrence Stenhouse
Teacher as researcher
We shall only teach better if we
learn intelligently from the experience of
shortfall, both in our grasp of the knowledge we
offer and of how to offer it. That is the case
for research as a basis for teaching. Lawrence
Stenhouse Feb 1979, University of East Anglia, UK
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Lawrence Stenhouse
Teacher as researcher
It is teachers who, in the end, will change the
world of the school by understanding
it. Inscription on Lawrence Stenhouses
memorial plaque at University of East Anglia.
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Carr Kemmis, 1986
Action research is simply a form of
self-reflective enquiry undertaken by
participants in social situations in order to
improve the rationality and justice of their own
practices, their understanding of these
practices, and the situations in which the
practices are carried out.
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Donald Schon Philosopher, researcher, professor
emeritus (MIT), made significant contributions to
the theory and practice of learning. Concerned
with professional learning, learning processes in
organizations, and with developing critical,
self-reflecting practice
Influential writing

• The Reflective Practitioner How Professionals
  think in Action (1983)
• Educating the Reflective Practitioner (1987)

http//www.infed.org/thinkers/et-schon.htm
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Reflection

• Latin reflectere To bend back
• Involves shuttling back and forth between
  thinking and action

13
http//www.infed.org/biblio/b-reflect.htm
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Levels of Reflectivity

• Level 1
• Involves technical application of knowledge and
  skills in the classroom setting.
• Level 2
• Emphasizes examination of assumptions underlying
  practice.
• Level 3
• Emphasizes moral and ethical issues of
  practicality to values and beliefs.

Quality Teaching Reflection, the heart of
Practice by Joelle K. Jay. 2003
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Knowing in Action
Donald Schon

• The sorts of knowledge we reveal in our
  intelligent action publicly observable,
  physical performances like riding a bicycle and
  private operations like instant analysis of a
  balance sheet. In both cases, the knowing is in
  the action. We reveal it by our spontaneous,
  skillful execution of the performance Schon,
  1987
• Knowing in action knowing more than we can say,
  the capacity to do the right thing (tacit
  knowledge).

http//hci.stanford.edu/other/schon87.htm
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Reflection in Action
Donald Schon

• Reflection takes place in the midst of action
• Capacity to respond to surprise through
  improvisation on the spot
• Involves a surprise (an unexpected
  outcome/behaviour that challenges ones knowing
  in action), a response to surprise conducting an
  action experiment on the spot by which we seek to
  solve the new problems we test our new way of
  seeing the situation, and also try to change that
  situation for the better.
• This is not method but art and a talent.

http//hci.stanford.edu/other/schon87.htm
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Donald Schon
Reflection on action
Pausing after an activity to see how it went
what went well, what did not, what could be
changed We develop sets of questions and ideaas
about our activities and practice
http//www.infed.org/biblio/b-reflect.htmSchon
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Reflection

• Looking back on experience to improve practice
• Learning in the midst of practice
• Making decisions about what to do

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Reflection
Stop to reflect
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Rushing around Life becomes a blur
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Reflection helps us to focus
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To think and act and think again
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Reflection is the bridge between thinking and
acting
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A reflective thinker is aware of her own
knowledge and lack of knowledge and recognizes
that there may not be only a single correct
solution to a problem or interpretation of a
situation. A reflective thinker relies on all
available resources to find relevant needed
information and opinions in order to come to a
personal understanding of a situation, knowing
that this understanding may change, as she gains
more information and insight into the matter.
http//ldt.stanford.edu/ldt1999/Students/cmazow/Ma
jorProject/refThinkLoMain.htm
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Jack Whitehead at the University of Bath Living
Educational Theory

• This methodological approach can then be
  developed as an action plan, which can take the
  form
• What is my concern?
• Why am I concerned?
• What do I think I can do about the situation?
• What will I do?
• How will I show whether I am influencing the
  situation for good?
• How will I produce evidence of my influence?
• How will I ensure that any claims I make are
  reasonably fair and accurate?
• What will I do then?
• Jack Whitehead and Jean McNiff

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Action Research refers to
Jean McNiff

• A particular way of researching your own
  learning
• A practical way of looking at your practice in
  order to check whether it is as you feel it
  should be
• If you feel that your practice needs attention in
  some way you will be able to take action to
  improve it, and then produce evidence to show in
  what way the practice has improved.

Jean McNiff, 2002 Action Research Principles and
Practice
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Action Research in Singapore (1998)

• teacher-initiated
• classroom investigation
• which seeks to increase
• the teachers understanding
• of classroom teaching and learning,
• and to bring about change
• in classroom practices.
• Teachers Network (Ministry of Education,
  Singapore) publication on Learning Circles

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Action Research Process in MOE
To improve the quality of teaching and learning

• Reflect
• Think about what we want to focus on
• Plan
• Plan what to do
• Act
• Carry out plan, collect evidence
• Observe
• Observe, monitor and record
• Reflect
• Reflect on what has happened to improve
  further.

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Learning Circle
PEPPER process - improving the quality of
teaching and learning
Enquiry
Reflection
Action
PEPPER is founded on Action Research Principles
and practice
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Reflect on

• Teaching effectiveness
  better understanding,
  grades, attitude towards learning, teaching
  materials and acquisition of the key competencies
• Classroom management discipline
  better student behaviour
  (punctuality, reduced disruptions in class,
  better attention span)
• Use of information technology
  - effective use of IT to
  deliver the content)
  
• Curriculum innovation
  -
  interdisciplinary efforts using Pmodel or similar
  frameworks eg. PBL
• Assessment methodologies
  - use of alternative
  assessment tools student portfolios,
  checklists, peer assessment, student reflections
• Development of students through CCA
  - leadership skills, self-esteem,
  personal development

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Products of Action Research Teachers
Professional Knowledge
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35
TSLN
New role for teachers
Students in the KBE need to be adaptable,
flexible and creativethere is a need to develop
a thinking student

• Teachers should share valuable insights and
  experiences in real classroom situations about
  students learning, about their subjects, about
  themselves
• Teachers should not work aloneshould network and
  talk with other teachers to develop more
  innovative teaching strategies
• Teachers should reflect continually on what they
  do and work with colleagues on how to do things
  better.

RADM Teo Chee Hean at the Teachers Conference
2001
"Teach Less, learn more"
PM Lee Hsien Loong
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The Teacher as a professional

• Who is a Reflective Practitioner
• Who creates professional knowledge
• Who is a lifelong learner
• Who continually improves on
• the quality of Teaching and Learning.

37
What are the key effects of Action Research on
the Professional development of teachers?
Teacher research will force the re-evaluation of
current theories and will significantly influence
what is known about teaching, learning, and
schooling. It has often been said, Teachers
leave a mark on their students, but they seldom
leave a mark on their profession (Wolf, 1989).
Through the process and products of action
research teachers will do both.
Beverly Johnson, Teacher-as-Researcher. ERIC
Digest.